


trade me for an apparition

by endofadream



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Brainwashing, HYDRA captures steve before the events of the avengers, M/M, Minor Body Horror, Minor Violence, Power Dynamics, Power Play, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, Winter Soldier Steve Rogers, a lot of parallels to winter soldier, adding tags as I go, it will have a happy ending I promise
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-17
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2018-10-19 22:47:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10649661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endofadream/pseuds/endofadream
Summary: Before they strap him to the table they bring Mission: Steven Grant Rogers--aka Captain America--to the Asset. In his tattered civilian clothes, bleeding and bruised and unconscious, he looks nothing like the legend. Asset does not care about that. It has been promised a new weapon, and that is all that it sees here.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i don't normally do chaptered fics because i'm so bad at updating on time, but i've been mulling over winter soldier cap for a long time. so i decided to say fuck it and post the first chapter at least to try and test the waters. i have a decent chunk of this written already or outlined so hopefully i can update it quicker! and the chapters will become longer, i promise.

They take the Asset to him. Strapped to a table, naked, he is harmless. Nothing like the soldier they had been talking about on the base for weeks after it was announced that Steve Rogers was alive. The Asset knows nothing, of course. It is merely an attack dog, a mutt used to do the dirty work of its handlers. All it knows is that this soldier, this Steve Rogers, is going to be its in the field. The shadow’s shadow.

The soldier is awake when Asset walks up to the table. Bruises cover his skin; lacerations, already healing, cover much of his body. Smeared across his chest and stomach are the rust stains of dried blood. The soldier had put up one helluva fight, Asset had heard from an agent. They almost hadn't gotten him. The new director, Pierce, had been very glad when they had.

The soldier’s skin is so pale that the bright red of the fresher blood makes such a startling mark where it blooms like summer blossoms. It reminds Asset of the Siberian snow, and when it reaches out to touch it is afraid that the soldier’s skin will melt under the touch of its flesh hand, like that snow. So instead it touches the soldier with its metal hand, the grooves trailing blood in delicate brushstroke swipes. It is then that the soldier opens its eyes.

Blue. So blue. Asset stares down as something skirts across his memory, a rabbit across the road: something about blue eyes that is gone as quickly as it comes. Blue eyes and warm sunshine. Asset does not have memories, only glitches. Or so they tell it. Asset does not question it, because why would a weapon have memories anyway?

Still the blue eyes haunt it, and when Asset closes its own it can see them still. Wide, the pupils small against the fluorescent lights.

The soldier strains against his bonds, struggling before lifting his head up and tipping his chin down. He does not take notice of Asset until he turns his head. Starts to say, “What in the hell—” before he sees that he is not alone. The fire crackling in those blue eyes snuffs out the minute he looks at Asset. It hardens to ice, to despair and anguish and horrified surprise. His voice, barely above a hoarse whisper, shakes as he asks, “Bucky?”

Asset blinks and its long hair falls into its eyes. “I do not know of this ‘Bucky’ you speak of. I am Asset, weapon of HYDRA, and soon you will be, too.”

It is more words than Asset has spoken in many wipes. It struggles to keep its words English, and cannot keep the thick Russian accent from smearing the rest. It can tell that it startles the soldier. His brow furrows as he studies Asset, bonds long forgotten.

“You—” he begins. His eyes film over with tears. “You’re from Brooklyn,” he says, like that should change anything. His gaze falls to Asset’s left arm and his face morphs into horror, his lips parting. “Buck, what have they done to you?”

“I have no beginning,” Asset says. Why is it so hard for the soldier to grasp? Perhaps they roughed him up a bit too much in the process of getting him here. No worries: soon the wipes will take care of everything that the soldier will not need to worry about once he becomes Оружие.

“Yes, you do,” the soldier insists. He begins struggling again. His tone rises and falls like a seismograph as he tries, and fails, to hide his panic. “You’re James Buchanan Barnes. You were my best friend. You were born in Brooklyn and you served the United States in World War Two. Every Friday night you would go out dancing and you always tried to set me up with some gal that never worked out because—”

The slap startles even the Asset. Since it did not use its metal hand the soldier’s cheek is only reddened as his head snaps sideways. It does not know what possessed it to slap the soldier. All it knows is that every word began to make its head ache more, like it was driving a dagger further and further into its brain. It could see, in the distance, faint glitches of things it had not experienced. Things that it could not have experienced. 

“Заткнись!” it snaps, then adds, “Shut up!” for the soldier’s benefit. “These are all lies, all false. You are thinking of someone else.” It wants to close its eyes against the heart rate that has risen in its chest at the soldier’s words, but it cannot show weakness. To show weakness is to invite death in and give it a meal.

No, it must appear unfazed by all of this. And why shouldn't it be? Asset knows that what the soldier is telling it are all lies; the soldier has been captured so it makes sense that he would create these lies under duress. Asset knows who it is, where its place lies. It is a mutt, a weapon, created from the bowels of the organization itself.

“Bucky, listen to me, please,” the soldier pleads. The strong muscles of his chest strain against the heavy leather, but the table is designed to hold even the Asset. It doesn’t budge. Fat tears begin to spill over down the sides of the soldier’s face at his confinement. “You’re in there, I know you are. Fight it. This isn't who you are.”

Asset turns, walking out of the room. At the doorframe it stops, rests it metal hand against it. Behind it the sounds of struggling intensifies, the table creaking under the weight. All Asset says is, “I am no one.”

——

“Mission report.”

Asset looks away, then down. It had been covered in blood and brains and a few teeth before arriving back at the facility; before being brought to Pierce it had been washed. Now its clothes still a little damp, and air that would be chilly to anyone else hardly bothers it.

“Target is dead,” replies Asset mechanically, finding its words because this is what it knows, mission reports. This is what it is allowed to keep in its brain. “The mission had only a few minor errors that were able to be corrected before they became an issue.”

Pierce nods and folds his hands together on top of his desk. He stares at Asset for a long time, and Asset feels little ants crawling under its skin. Pierce is quietly formidable, quietly dangerous. Asset drops to its knees for him with a snap of his fingers. It has killed agents and performed unnamable service acts. Pierce is redoing Asset’s conditioning, he’s said. It is no longer in Soviet control.

“You’re a little slower these days, aren't you?” Pierce finally supplies, tone not unlike that of a parent speaking to a particularly dumb child.

Asset cocks its head. It is in fine, serviceable condition. It is still as fast and strong as it was the day it was created. It does not understand, but it doesn’t risk saying that. “I do not see any problems with my programming, sir,” it says. “There is nothing to assess.”

Pierce says nothing for a long while. Asset waits with infinite patience, staring blankly at the far wall, until Pierce finally stands and crosses around his desk to size up Asset.

“You have served HYDRA well,” he begins. “You were crucial in creating the world we have now. But even weapons get old no matter how well-maintained they are. New models come out, models that are better and more powerful.”

“Sir?”

Asset is not quite sure what to think. It has served admirably for its entire life. The early-on problems, like the escape to New York, were fixed. It has not defected again. Obedience and compliance make up its very being. It has done so much.

“Follow me,” Pierce commands. Asset does not hesitate.

It is led down the hallways, into the deeper parts of the compound. Lights glow red here, shading the cement walls, and the air grows damper and cooler. Pierce stops at the last door on the right, when there are no more hallways or turns. While he keys in the code a shiver runs through the Asset, though it is not sure why, because it is born of the Siberian cold. Asset does not let its mind dwell on much other than the tasks at hand, but if it could it would say that the shiver isn’t from chill but something else entirely.

The door starts moving with a clang, exposing bright white light in a bright white room. It slides shut after they step inside.

The soldier is on the floor this time, slumped with his back against the far wall. The doctors have clothed him in nondescript clothes, a plain white shirt and baggy brown pants. He is haggard and pallid. Nothing like the strong man on the table. When they approach he does not even look up in defiance.

“Come to humiliate me some more?” he asks, a hollow voice that echoes in a hollow room, when Pierce stops a few feet from him, Asset slightly behind.

Pierce shakes his head and folds his arms across his chest. “Just come to give you a little reminder before we store it away for next time, Captain.”

The soldier raises his head, his mouth set in a grim line. At first his gaze does not settle on Asset, swiveling instead around the room as he takes in his surroundings. Finally it does, with hesitance; for a reason it cannot explain Asset does not like the emptiness it finds there. The eyes it is staring at are devoid of life: to look into them is to look into nothing. And to see much strength zapped is…unsettling.

For a few long moments the soldier looks like he wants to speak but is trying to pretend like he is not interested. There is a cut above his eye, slowly knitting together, and his blond hair falls limp over his forehead. It watches Asset with calculating, dead eyes. Finally, his indifference wavers, his lip slightly trembling, and he speaks with a desperate abruptness.

“Bucky—” he tries.

It snaps Asset out of its study. Two rabbits run across the road, both with blue eyes. Both make him feel warm and cold at the same time. Its head flares an ache and he almost cries out at the pain, how it consumes him and makes the bright lights of the room feel like needles in his eyes. He hears it, _Bucky_ , floating in some distance space—

It strikes forward in blind anger. Metal fist smashing into the wall, tile cracking down to the floor, Asset shouts, “Баки мертв! Я не он! **”** and shakes. The arm whirs as it pulls back. Asset lets it fall limply to its side. Inside its head it is like there are a million bees crawling and buzzing around. It wants to destroy this soldier. It wants to destroy this room it’s in, and everyone in it. Its breaths are ragged and sharp.

Pierce is looking satisfied about something. The soldier has kept his head down, and nothing about his body suggests an elevated heart rate or anything registering close to fear. Asset does not feel much, but rage is something they left inside it as a driving factor; now it’s feeling rage in red-tinged droves.

It does not understand its own outburst. It is malfunctioning. Weapons do not have memories, and these flashes it is getting, of tall buildings in the summer sun, of the alabaster smear of a face like the soldier’s with indiscernible features, are certainly not its own. There must be a glitch, and it must address it immediately or else risk its programming.

The soldier looks up calmly. On his shirt is white dust and shards of tile. The only sound in the room is Asset’s faintly labored breathing. The soldier looks down at his hands and says, almost as if to himself, “If this is the end of the line, so be it.” To Pierce he says, jaw squared as he lifts his chin, “I’m not giving up.”

Pierce is gesturing Asset out, not even bothering to look at the broken soldier on the floor as he replies, “That’s what Barnes said, too.” The door slides shut the and the soldier is alone.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i said it would be longer, and it is, but only by a little bit. whoops.

The Asset is frozen before the soldier’s reboot is complete. When it is woken up it is taken to the chair on legs that won’t work, its body still cold, two men on either side dragging that useless body along. Asset wishes it could say no, wishes it could ask for the narrow tube of the chamber, the deep dark sleep the cold provides.

_It thinks it remembers a dream—can weapons dream?—of a boy who looked familiar, golden blond and skinny with pale skin. The boy called him Bucky, and he called the boy Steve. But it does not know a Bucky or a Steve._

They put the halo around its head to clean up any of the cobweb collected from the time its brain had been shut down. The electricity pulsing into it chases away the last bits of cold. The gag between its teeth prevents it from screaming. The dream _?_ turns into scraps of paper floating on the breeze.

The halo is removed and it slumps forward, chin dipping down towards its chest. It is weak, gasping and confused, when the book is brought out. It likes the book even less because it activates the machine inside it, has it growling “Готовы к соблюдению” even though it just wants to be back inside the chamber where thought does not come to fruition. It does not want to obey.

“We got a little present for you,” the handler says gruffly, once Asset is out of the chair.

Asset tilts is head, blinking. Present…it does not know the connotation of that word. And it is not an activation sequence, or an order, so it does not speak.

The handler stares, shaking his head. “Fuckin’ creepy robot.” He grabs Asset’s flesh arm. “Come on.”

It is led down to the armory, following closely behind. It isn’t sure how long it has been out; it never asks and it is never told. Judging from the lingering weakness in its limbs, and the hollow, cold feeling in its gut it has been awhile.

They stop at the door, the handler punching in his code. When the door slides open Asset is pushed into the room. iIts handler says, “No need for introductions since you two know each other so well already.”

The other person in the room, a tall, imposing, broad figure of a man, turns around from where he is browsing their collection of semi-automatics. The man is pale. Jagged, from his eyebrow, over his eye, and down his cheek, is the pale pink shine of a scar.

Asset blinks. “Кто это?” he questions. Then, “Who’s this?”

“Right, forgot,” Asset’s handler chuckles in the silence. “Mind wipes. Asset, meet Weapon. Weapon, meet Asset.”

Weapon’s gear is all black, like Asset’s, but instead of the red star on his arm it is on his chest, bright and blazing; on his abdomen are four broad, vertical red stripes. Asset does not know why it looks familiar, but it does. Then the thought is pushed from Asset’s head.

They both stand still, staring at each other. Calculating, the way Asset is in the field. Like two territorial tomcats meeting for the first time.

There is something about Weapon that Asset cannot quite grasp, whether it is the coldness in his eyes or the way he squares his shoulders, pushing his posture straight. How it looks like righteousness from two different ends of the spectrum, good and evil at war with each other. It…is not quite familiarity, but it is something. Asset tilts its head a fraction.

The handler steps in. “This here is Weapon. I don’t know what his Russian name is ‘cause I don’t speak any of that shit. He’s fresh outta the box for you, hasn’t even cut his teeth on the field yet. He was one helluva challenge to wrangle, even more than you. Took a lotta time and a lotta our best resources to break him.”

Weapon dips his head. His hair is blond, his eyes blue. The rabbit runs across the road again. It feels like more than just coincidence, or a clever play. It feels like fate.

He says, “Оружие.”

“Зимний солдат,” Asset replies. Their names dovetail: _The Winter Soldier’s Weapon._

Asset glances sideways. “Mine?”

“All yours,” the handler confirms. Asset does not quite know how to process this. It is not given things very often, especially something like this. It looks forward again. Weapon stands still with his hands clasped behind his back, his eyes the only thing moving as they switch between Asset and the handler.

If Asset was capable of suspicion, this would raise it. In all its years of service it has never been given anything; it always borrows, always has to return, otherwise it gets punished with the stun baton or worse. But since it is not it just nods and says “Thank you. I will take good care of him.”

The handler claps Asset on the back, then Weapon. “Times are changing,” he says. “Why settle for one Fist when you can have two? Especially this brand-new one that’s gonna make a lotta people tremble in their boots.” He grins and ruffles their hair self-satisfactorily. “Hail HYDRA, soldiers.”

“Hail HYDRA,” Weapon and Asset intone immediately.

——

Weapon is…formidable, to say the least.

He heals quicker, runs faster, takes targets out with such brute force that Asset often finds itself impressed. They take him on a solo mission as a test run, something small. Weapon kills every person in the building without hesitating and blows it up without a single ounce of self-preservation.

Though he does not possess Asset’s accuracy with a gun he is given a disc of sorts painted in a similar style to his uniform, all red and black. This he throws with deadly precision, successfully incapacitating their targets when Weapon is taken on another solo mission.

Weapon is, also, more volatile. If Asset is a gun, then Weapon is a powder keg in the wake of an open flame.

Asset has learned over long, cold decades that anything less than perfect obedience results in pain. Weapon is too quick to lash out, snarling at handlers and going for their throats. He is an attack dog, obedient as long as it is useful and willing to turn to protect itself. They know this; Asset has heard vague rumors, that they went too far in the wiping process and made him feral, or that there is something in him still fighting.

After their first mission together Weapon successfully kills three of the field agents that are with them using only his teeth and bare hands. Breathing hard and dripping red he looks at Asset and its gun trained on him. Asset does not know why but aiming its firearm at Weapon makes something deep inside it ache; still, it does not lower it until Weapon is cuffed by the remaining agents, kicking and screaming a feral sound, hands clawing bloody streaks on their gear.

Afterwards, bleeding and bruised from their fists and the butts of their weapons, they force him into the chair. Asset watches from the sidelines, handler at its side with his fingers clenched around its flesh arm. As the metal halo is lowering onto Weapon’s head they ask him why. His bare chest heaves, forearms splitting with muscle as he curls his hands into tight fists.

Spitting a mouthful of blood, Weapon snarls, “Потому что я могу.”

A low murmuring begins among the agents; following it is a sense of unease, a wondering of whether they had finally achieved a machine that would kill them all, the growing dread that all men who play God feel when their creation starts to take a life of its own. _Because I can_ opens a gateway into another world, one full of the kind of dysphoria found within the musty pages of a pulp novel. Their worried eyes dart back and forth, occasionally landing on Asset even though it is the picture of obedience standing still and tall at its handler’s side.

They don’t use the mouthguard on Weapon like they do Asset, because he does not scream. His hands claw at the armrests, oh yes, and his face is the very mask of pain, but nothing louder than a low groan ever escapes his lips. Asset wonders how: the voltage of that machine sears white-hot, makes it feel like its brain is on fire, every unfurling tendril of memory singed at its source before it can bloom.

Asset catalogues Weapon’s body language. It sees nothing but defiance, hatred, up until it can see the machine wipe the last bits and Weapon’s eyes grow dull again. A thin sheen of sweat coats his heaving chest as the halo parts and agents rush in to unstrap him, get him while he’s docile. They lead him, panting, to the room where two chambers sit side-by-side.

Asset turns to watch Weapon be led away, and something in it itches to follow. A primal sense to protect, the urge to save, an urge that is foreign and terrifying. Asset’s heart begins to pound. For once it wants the chair, wants the electricity to sear away whatever this is. It must obey. That is its mission when there is no outside one: obey and serve. Order through pain was stamped into its very ribs when it was created, and that mantra it will follow as fervently as it does its field orders.

“This one,” a doctor says as Asset goes obediently to the chair, an old fear lancing through it as the motions are begun to strap it in and restart the machine. The doctor is an old man, stooped, with thin, short brown hair and tired eyes. Asset stares ahead, its heart beginning to pick up again at each progress in the routine. The doctor looks Asset in the eye and Asset stares back. Obey. Obey. Let them do this. “This one may be old, but for it obedience is like breathing. And as long as we keep these wipes up that will be all it wants to do.”

Asset struggles, the way it always does as the halo is lowered and the mouthguard shoved into its mouth. Its chest heaves, eyes open, unseeing, at the ceiling as the machine is turned on. It stinks of fear. Its nostrils are clogged with it. It thinks it is screaming, but it knows nothing but pain. The brick buildings, and the pale face, begin to slip away, morphing first into smudges on a canvas, and then into nothing at all.

——

“Perhaps we made a mistake with this one. We all knew that he came with a temper.”

Asset is receiving a checkup when the voices start to filter in from the room adjacent. Pierce had gone in there with a doctor, short with thin brown hair, whose face Asset feels it should know but has blended into a mixed-up jumble of all the doctors it has seen. It tries not to listen as its vitals are taken and the little bag of nutrient solution is attached to the IV in the back of its flesh hand, but with its enhanced hearing it is difficult to not listen in.

Pierce’s name is the only one it bothers to remember—or maybe is the only one it can remember, stamped into its brain with clean efficiency like its trigger words. It takes it a moment to figure out that they’re talking about Weapon, who is already in cryosleep.

Weapon had attacked two techs, nearly killing one. Asset has done the same, many, many times, but it always cows under the brute punishment that HYDRA has to offer. Weapon does not, and therefore he had to be put to sleep. To learn a lesson, they said. And Asset nodded, because it knew, and it accepted.

“I had assumed that it would be to our advantage,” Pierce says. “He sees the enemy and he—”

“What if he still thinks of us as the enemy?”

Asset’s metal hand flexes into a fist, joints whirring. The tech jumps slightly, looking nervously at it. Asset continues to stare straight ahead. How dare this doctor. HYDRA are the bearers of a new world, not an enemy like those trying to stop them. Weapon had just malfunctioned. That was all. It is not uncommon, and it happens to Asset quite often. Like a gun jamming.

Weapon is new, too. All Asset knows is that quite some time has passed since it went under and was brought out to witness Weapon’s first field mission; there are new people around, and newer equipment, and Pierce looks older than he had. It reasons to stand that of course Weapon would malfunction until it was oiled properly. Asset had resisted at first, too, filled with rage for reasons it could not comprehend.

“We created him!” shouts Pierce. “He’s ours, and he knows it—”

“We are not God, Alexander. We’re taking His creations and playing with them. Bending and twisting them in ways they’re not supposed to go. Maybe this is a sign that this should all be shut down and both weapons terminated—”

Asset abruptly stands and swings at the tech with its metal arm, throwing him backwards into the wall. The IV rips from its hand, blood beginning to flow sluggishly down its fingers. The door immediately opens, three more techs rushing in, and Asset manages to subdue two more before its handler rushes in and jams the stun baton against the side of Asset’s neck.

Asset screams. It must protect Weapon, it must it must. Weapon is its property, Weapon is everything, a small boy with paper-thin skin and bright blue eyes—

A gunshot rings tinnily in the next room.


	3. Chapter 3

It hates the cold, but it yearns for the isolation. Asset still feels the chill of the ice on its extremities as it is drug from the chamber and to the chair. Once it is reactivated it is taken to technicians, who poke and prod every inch, checking on the operation status of its metal arm, then its vitals, an IV drop attached to nourish the body as it thaws. Asset does not stay present for most of these: usually it drifts, somewhere dark and safe in its own mind.

Once it is deemed safe and operational it is brought to the training area. Weapon is there, broad and tall and dressed in full gear, black vest and shirt, black boots and tight black pants. He is pacing the mat in quick, focused animal strides. The motions make the muscles of his arms bunch and flex; Asset must tear its eyes away. It should not let its gaze linger too long: that had been a lesson it had learned many awakenings ago.

It steps in and Weapon’s head turns; immediately he’s grinning, an act that looks unnatural on his hardened face. “олдат,” he greets. He spreads his arms wide to the empty training center, its many weights and machines. “They want us to spar.”

“Spar?” questions Asset.

“Keep our reflexes honed,” answers Weapon. “It…has been some time, according to Pierce. Since we have been activated.”

Asset stares. In its long history as the Fist of HYDRA it has never been asked to _spar_. Have they become insufficient? All of their fighting skills are wired into the neural synapses of their brains, locked in where they cannot corrode. It does not understand. It had trained, many decades ago, groups of little girls, but that had a purpose. It was a mission and an order. This is neither of those.

“Do they think we are becoming insubstantial?” Asset asks. There has been no briefing, and Asset cannot act without a proper briefing. The Soldier may be activated but it needs instructions. It cannot just be used to _spar_. Like...like some common agent. It is the Soldier. It could make even Pierce himself cower.

The grin slips from Weapon’s face, and is replaced instead with a pulled-down sneer, a challenge glinting in his eyes.

“Do you think you cannot handle me?” he pushes. He steps into Asset’s space, chest-to-chest, and gives Asset a shove. “Are you afraid, cолдат?”

" _Хуй тебе_ ,” Asset spits. It is an unconscious reaction, drug deep from within itself. Weapon has always had a way of pushing the Asset just that one step further. The tone of voice Weapon used just then could only be considered goading.

An image moves behind the Asset’s eyes, too brief to fully focus on. All Asset knows, right now, is the rise of adrenaline in its veins, the firm muscle of Weapon’s chest under its flesh fist as it punches with deadly precision and sends Weapon flying back. When Weapon stands and shakes off the damage, the grin is back into place. The plates on Asset's metal arm click and whir.

They are evenly matched, the Soldier and its Weapon; gaining the upper hand is nearly impossible with their identical training and hand-to-hand skills. Even with the mechanical hand Asset soon finds itself breathing hard and kneeling on the mat, the imprint of Weapon’s fist throbbing on its solar plexus, before it can stand and move forward.

Weapon snarls, baring an animal grin, all teeth gleaming white from pulled-back lips. Pressed this close, Weapon’s skin hot under his uniform, something stirs inside Asset, deep in its gut. It is not quite the warmth of exertion, but it is something similar, simmering, making Asset draw in a surprised breath.

Weapon uses Asset’s preoccupation to his advantage, flipping Asset roughly onto its back, pinning it with knees on Asset’s arms. Asset looks up, back throbbing from the force that it hit the floor. Weapon’s eyes are so blue, so close…

_You gonna do it or what, Stevie?_

Asset gasps. It swings its cybernetic arm up, unseating Weapon, and lets out a snarl of its own as it pins Weapon chest-first to the floor. The voice continues to echo inside its head, vibrating like sound in a canyon. It gathers up Weapon’s wrists in its left hand, twisting them roughly.

Weapon lets out a sharp cry, then a laugh, shaking Asset’s body. “That all you got?”

_C’mon, that all you got? Like you mean it, Barnes._

Asset drops its hold as its head throbs with the resurgence of the unknown male voice. Weapon whirls, grabbing Asset’s throat and throwing it back. There is pain as its breath catches, but it is nothing compared to the pain in its head. Weapon strikes its face, hard, closed-fist, and the Asset does not taste the blood.

“Fight back!” Weapon says, hitting Asset again. But Asset is—it’s not here, it is somewhere else, eyes open and seeing a small boy who possesses Weapon’s strong, even baritone. The mind cannot make up faces, it knows, but it is still is not sure why this small boy looks so _similar_. The anger in Weapon’s voice should command him back to the present, but Asset is still watching this small boy, with his big nose and big eyes—

“достаточное количество!”

The command breaks them both: Weapon skitters away, leaving Asset to gasp, coughing wetly. It tastes blood; when it touches its flesh hand to its face it feels the broken, swollen skin. The apparition of the small boy vanishes, and in its place is the pure mechanical precision of the weapon back online.

“I asked you to spar,” says the handler, “not beat the fucking _shit_ out of each other.”

“There is a difference?” Weapon asks, and gets a boot to his face for his trouble.

“Pierce is gonna have my fuckin’ _head_ when he sees the state of you useless attack mutts,” the handler mutters. “Christ. Can’t do a goddamn thing without making sure these braindead freaks don’t kill each other.”

Asset looks over at Weapon, who looks back. His cheek is swollen, bright red and already fading. A little blood remains in the corner of his mouth. He spits it at the handler’s feet with a sharp grin.

This time Weapon receives the stun baton, and his wounded whine as the electricity sizzles against his exposed flesh has Asset’s hackles rising. Before it can comprehend what it is doing it is up and lunging for the handler, knocking him to the ground.

It moves on autopilot, like it is on a mission. Only this time the mission is an incomprehensible rush of thoughts, _must protect must save do not touch mine mine_ ** _mine_ ** and it can feel the blood on its flesh hand, the easy way the flesh gives under it as it gouges, ripping apart this man who _dared_ to hurt what was its property. It wants this handler’s heart to stop beating, wants his gurgled screams to cease.

In the end it is Weapon who pulls it off, big arms tight around Asset’s waist. Asset is panting, adrenaline spiking its heart rate and making its muscle sing with energy. It wants to kill, rage, scream. But it cannot; it knows it has messed up, and it knows it will receive punishment.

“перевести дух,” Weapon says. The blood on Asset’s fingers drip drip _drips_ to the floor in the silence. It tries to expand and deflate its chest properly, per Weapon’s instructions. “They will come,” he adds.

“I will be punished and put to sleep,” Asset replies.

Weapon nods from behind. “You will.” A beat. “I am sorry. That…that they will take you from me.”

“They hurt you,” replies Asset, fiercely. “They do not hurt you under my watch. You are _mine_. My weapon. Оружие.”

Weapon turns Asset around. His face is the closest thing to rueful they are allowed. “Зимний солдат,” he says.

Asset nods. Blood continues to drip to the floor. A large inky pool of it spreads around the dead handler’s body. His flesh is splayed open like a science experiment on display. Asset swallows down the urge to spit on his corpse.

“I will be here when you wake up,” Weapon says. The doors open and eight agents march in, dressed in full TAC gear. This time, Asset does not put up a fight.

——

_There’s a hand-rolled cigarette between his fingers, tight and precise as ever. Steve sits with him on the rooftop, though seated upwind so the smoke doesn’t aggravate his lungs. Down below Brooklyn is quiet in the early-morning hours; for once, Mr. Grayson down the block isn’t yelling at his good-for-nothing son. There aren’t cars honking._

_It’s a rare thing, a tranquil city. Brooklyn especially; it’s full of Irish, of troublemakers who don’t keep a regular schedule and people who don’t keep steady jobs. In the Heights, shouting matches can go on until the sky turns purple with dawn._

_He takes a drag and blows the smoke against the breeze. In the companionable silence he lets his mind go blank, focusing only on the inhale-exhale motions of smoking. The way that it plumes out, a brief thing, before disappearing._

_He turns. “Steve?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“You wanna go to Coney Island?”_

_Steve gives him a look like he’s sure that he’s finally cracked. “It’s the middle a the night. ‘Sides, we ain’t got a dollar to rub together between us.”_

_He shakes his head. “Not now. Just…sometime. Again.” The cigarette is damp between his lips when he takes a drag. He misses filters, but pre-rolled cigarettes have been out of his price range ever since Steve got taken down with pneumonia again and had to stay in the hospital for three days._

_Steve’s face softens. “‘Course I’ll go with you again, you idiot. Who else is gonna force me to ride things that are gonna make me puke my guts up?”_

_That smile could make the whole world stop spinning. He hopes his cheeks aren’t flushing too much, and takes such a deep drag that it nearly sends him coughing. Running a hand through his hair he ducks his head and tries not to pay too much attention to the thud of his heart. It’ll do more harm than good right now anyway._

_“Hey, Steve,” he says again once the cigarette is done. Now that he can he closes the gap between them. Breathes in Steve’s scent of charcoal and cheap soap and the faint hint of his own cologne._

_“Yeah?” Steve tears his eyes away from the pinpoints of the city’s lights._

_“If you could see just one thing in your lifetime, right now, what would it be?”_

_Steve tips his head back, brow furrowed in concentration, and he follows, his own gaze tracking the same inky black patch of sky. Eventually, Steve simply says, “The stars. All of ‘em.”_

——

Asset wakes.

It screams.

Weapon is there, wide blue eyes and _Steve Steve Steve_ on Asset’s tongue, vision fogged as it limply allows itself to be drug from its chamber. Hazy images flash around inside its mind, each making less sense than the last. Sensory memories, the stench of trash on a hot day, the sea-salt in the breeze. Weapon follows the procession, a silent presence in full TAC gear, foreboding to anyone else but comforting to Asset’s jumbled-up brain.

It looks up, squints and blinks. Whispers, quietly, “Steve…?”

Weapon turns. His lips thin.

Asset is shoved into the chair, wrists locked into place. It flexes, instinctively, trying to fight it. Its heart rate picks up, breath shortening. Familiar motions. Only this time Weapon is here.

Before the halo is turned on, Weapon leans down to Asset’s ear, tucking a damp strand of hair behind. It is him who puts the mouthguard in, fingers lingering. He catches Asset’s eye: in his own is something like pleading, the last, desperate look of a man with a gun pointed to his head.

He whispers, “Bucky.”

Electricity pulses inside Asset’s brain as it screams again.

——

By the time Asset is mission-ready its mind is blank, save for the instructions of the mission. An old German diplomat who had gone back on a promise. He is to be terminated and made to look like a suicide. Weapon, also freshly wiped, is to join. When they meet they are both silent, acknowledging each other with only stiff nods. Weapon looks especially intimidating in his mission black, his hair freshly trimmed to fall over the unscarred side of his face. Both fall into parade rest as Pierce briefs them of the details and the location.

Pierce fits them with the muzzles personally, turning to retrieve them from an agent. While they’re in his hands they look almost benign. Just two pieces of a uniform.

Weapon is first, and he raises his chin as Pierce steps before him with the first mask in hand. Weapon’s jaw clicks, once, eyes narrowed before he lowers his head and lets Pierce slip it on and fasten the back. He straightens and stares Pierce down with unmoving, unforgiving blue eyes; Pierce smiles, slow and self-assured. Untouchable. It makes Asset’s anger simmer against its unbreakable barrier.

Once Asset’s is on and it is breathing in the familiar recycled air it follows Weapon down to the launchpad. It takes mental notes of the knives on its body (chest, thigh, ankle, thigh, waist, sleeve on its flesh arm) and rotates its neck, working out a kink.

Their usual handler is running the mission, a handler that Asset has learned is named Rumlow. It is not programmed to like or dislike others, but Rumlow makes him antsy. He’s quick to punish, quick to lash up Asset’s back or push him back into the chamber. More than once Weapon’s punishments for his various insubordinations have been at Rumlow’s hands.

Asset cuts a glance sideways as they step onto the loading bay of the plane; Weapon is already looking over, a look in his eyes that Asset cannot quite perceive.

——

Their rendezvous point is a clearing in the Black Forest. Weapon reaches it first, dropping heavily onto a log. Asset follows after checking the perimeter and deeming it safe. Around it the trees rustle in the breeze, the brittle fall leaves making dry scraping sounds. The air is thick with nature, with pine and undergrowth and the crisp scent of the mountain.

It feels like Asset has done this before, waiting in the woods with Weapon, even though they have not, at least that it can recall. Another malfunction? The information gets stored away for its mission report; for now, it takes a seat next to Weapon, letting out a low groan at the faint burn and protest of its muscles.

Its gear still stinks of soot from the fire and kickback from its weapons. It removes its mask and goggles, taking in deep breaths when it sets them aside. After a moment, Weapon does the same. Asset studies his profile, watches the way that Weapon tucks a longer strand of hair behind his ear. For reasons unknown to Asset their handlers prefer them with longer hair, although they keep Weapon’s tidier than Asset’s. It is not tactically advantageous in any way.

“Who were we?” Asset asks eventually, watching a bird float across the evening sky. It isn’t much more than a black speck, but it is fascinating to Asset all the same. What would it be like to fly, to be so high above everything else? To not worry, to not—

“What do you mean?” asks Weapon.

It startles Asset; the bird flies away. It had forgotten that it even asked a question. “I mean…before this,” it says, gesturing uselessly, hands spread wide. “There has to be a before. There always is.” Handlers had talked about a god who creates; if they were created, there had to be causation.

“We are machine,” Weapon replies. His metal disc is at his side, resting against the log. “There is nothing before our creation. We are drawn from blueprints. Nothing more.”

“There must be a beginning,” Asset insists.

Weapon looks over. In the fading sunlight his scar stands out, ugly and overwhelming. His eyes are narrowed and icy blue. “Why are you asking this, Актив?” There is a tone to his words, something skeptical, that Asset does not like. It’s sharply dangerous, like the glint of a knife as it is pulled.

How does Asset explain itself? That no matter how many wipes it goes through things trickle in, flashes and snippets of things it cannot explain? That sometimes when it looks at Weapon it sees not the scarred, imposing figure next to it but something small and fragile and innocent? Weapon is still strong and new and Asset sometimes fears him, not for who he is but what he is. The weapon that HYDRA gave it with its hair-trigger temper. The weapon with faultless programming, who does not malfunction like Asset does, where sometimes it grows forgetful or distracted.

Instead, Asset shakes its head and drops it into its hands. “I do not know. I don’t…things are confusing, Стив.”

As soon as it is out of its mouth Asset freezes. It feels like the world has gone still, the birds silent, the wind disappeared. Why that name slipped out of its mouth, Asset does not know. But from the tension palpable beside it, Weapon does not know, either.

“Why did you call me that?” he asks.

_Steve._ Asset does not know that American name, but it still feels right in its mouth. _Steve._ A name it does not know but should; a name that has history, that _means_ something. But what, Asset does not know. So it says this, “I do not know,” and looks over at Weapon, pleads, “Don’t tell anyone. It was just a relapse, a mistake. Please, Оружие.”

Weapon places his arm over Asset’s shoulder and leans close. Asset inhales deep, takes in the cordite smell of gunpowder, of blood. The freshness of the woods; and, underneath, whatever is unique to Weapon. Asset is accustomed to it for some reason, even finding comfort in it, like now.

“Hold on just a little longer,” Weapon says. “Soon they will come, and soon you can undergo maintenance to make you forget all of these troubling things.”

Asset nods, but something niggles at it, a crawling just under its skin. It does not speak the words aloud, but it moves a fraction of an inch closer to Weapon, just to feel his solid warmth, and thinks _but what if I don’t want to forget?_


	4. Chapter 4

It wakes up. Cold, gasping, disoriented. Weapon is there, staring with indifferent eyes and a furrowed brow. It has a half-aborted thought, like an old memory clawing its way laboriously to the surface from the depths. _My name is Bu—_

By the time the thought has begun Asset is already in the chair. The halo is already lowered. It gets no further than that first syllable before the electricity is turned on and its back snaps taut. The thought evaporates like smoke; all Asset can focus on is the pain, the way that the continuous shock feels like it’s ripping everything out from the root, leaving it barren. Screams muffled in the mouthguard, metal fist click and whirring. Fight goes next, and when the machine is finally turned off Asset falls, limp, head down as it heaves in gasping breaths. _No more. Please, no more._

Another technician comes in. The book is here. Some fear still remains when Asset sees that red cover with its faded black star in the middle. Mostly it is hate. It wonders if Weapon needs the commands, too. But for some reason Weapon is always ready, unlike Asset, who grows disoriented and useless the longer it goes without the chamber. Before the words it has no purpose. It is like a light switched off. An empty notebook. A soldier without a war to fight.

Asset still fights despite the back thrum of pain. Whatever it is before the Soldier is woken, whatever this vessel retains, it can feel it slide away, bit by bit, as every word snaps into place and lights up a network in its brain, giving rise to that dark shadow that lurks just off to the side.

At _грузовой вагон_ it goes still. The rest disappears, making it all clean precision and laser focus. It clenches its fists and the metal one whirs, arm clicking into place. It looks up, meets the eyes of the technician and meets the eyes of Weapon. It is an asset, the Asset. Here is its purpose: here is its war.

“ _Я готов отвечать_ ,” it says.

——

They’re sent on a joint mission to Zadar, and Asset easily soaks up the fresh sea air. Though it does not know much of its own likes and dislikes, it does know that it likes the salt scent of the ocean. It unearths something like familiarity within it. Even through the mask it filters in, and Asset inhales deeply when it steps off the truck that had transported them to these hills from the plane. Weapon departs beside it, hooking his disc to the magnet at his back harness. The breeze catches the longer strands of his hair and blow it in front of his goggles. Under the safety of its own goggles Asset stares.

Rumlow steps out, sunglasses on against the midday sun. Asset switches to watch him carefully, no movement other than the quick dart of its eyes. Almost unconsciously its hand strays to the Sig at its waist. Though its gloved fingers rest on the smooth metal, it knows that it won’t do anything. It cannot. Rebelling means the chair. Means pain and punishment, invasive procedures _just because_.

It must obey. Order through pain. Hail HYDRA.

“Asset,” says Rumlow, “Weapon.”

Both nod in recognition.

“You have been briefed already on the way here,” Rumlow continues. “You have two hours. Don’t fuck it up. Weapon, you go in first. Asset, you follow.” Asset does not outwardly show a reaction, but it is confused by the change in protocol. Usually it is the one leading, and it is Weapon at its six. It keeps its mouth shut, does not question, just nods and follows Weapon in saying _yes, sir_. Rumlow smiles, sharp, and says, “Hail HYDRA.”

“Hail HYDRA,” Weapon and Asset intone together, glancing at the other.

The target is easy enough, almost too easy for the both of them. It is Weapon who takes him out with his disc as he runs. The target is decapitated smoothly, body spraying graceful arcs of blood as it collapses to the ground.

Asset walks over, kicking the head aside as it bends to retrieve Weapon’s disc. It is lighter than Asset had expected, but still heavy. Blood is splattered along one edge, blending almost too well with the red star in its center. Curious, Asset slides its flesh arm through the straps on the back and hefts it up the way it has watched Weapon do.

_—The train car, rattling along the tracks and making him unsteady on his feet. The shield is out of his friend’s hands, so he must pick it up. He has to be brave. He has to save his friend. He fires blindly, purely out of the instinct of protection, keeping an eye on the still-unfamiliar broad figure. He stares too long, gets sidetracked, there’s a hole in the side of the train and the wind is like ice and he’s falling and—_

“ _Актив?_ ”

Asset snaps back into the present. It discovers that it is shaking and that it feels chilled like it has just come out of the chamber. Weapon is walking toward it, goggles pushed up to the top of his head. He looks concerned as he says, “Are you all right?”

Asset swallows. It is not sure what it had just experienced. There have not—it does not think that there had been missions involving a train. Asset recalls all of its targets, and of the ones in the snow, a train does not immediately come to its mind. It cannot be memories, because Asset is a weapon, and weapons do not have those. They do not need them to function. People get memories. Asset is not one of those. It is an it; nothing more. There is nothing lower than an it, Asset had been told once in the middle of punishment. The whip sharp on its bare back, slicing deep through the layers of flesh and muscle. _You are less than nothing, Asset. You are only still alive because you serve a purpose to us._

Wordlessly it hands Weapon his disc, shakes its head and says, “I am fine, Оружие.”

Weapon does not look convinced, but lets it slide as he says, “Come. There is a safe house we are instructed to wait in until they come to collect us.”

——

Asset gladly strips off the goggles and mask when they are safe in the small house. It takes in greedy gulps of fresh air, cataloguing everything within sight. One spare room, one tiny kitchen, one door off to its right. Temperature approximately twenty degrees celsius. Food in the cabinets and in the fridge; nonperishables. There is one small couch and one small chair.

“How long?” it asks.

Weapon sits down on the small couch, stretching his long legs out. For some reason this makes a heat kindle in Asset’s lower abdomen, trailing to its genitals. Its brows crinkle in concern and it looks quickly away, not understanding as it tries to shake off this uncomfortable feeling.

“Not long,” replies Weapon.

Asset does not question why Weapon has the answers: like everything else, it is trained to accept things as they come. Instead it leans against the kitchen counter and tips its head back to the ceiling. Asset does not like idle time. Idle time leaves time to think and ruminate, and many of those instances make Asset angry and confused. It glances again to Weapon on the couch and notes how he hasn’t been shaved.

“I was recognized once, on a mission,” says Asset, after silence stretches on. Not sure why it wants to share this information it presses forward anyway. “At least…I think I was. I do not—what he called me, I do not think that he meant me.” Every time it dredges up the memory, one of the few that has survived the constant wipes, it gets a little more unreal. After all, it is the Asset, the Soldier. Those are its names. There exist no others.

“What was it?” Weapon asks, eventually, pinning Asset with his eyes. “What was the name?”

The heat returns, along with a tremble of helplessness. Asset has to swallow to wet its suddenly dry mouth. It has never admitted this out loud in fear of repercussion, so when it does the words struggle, tripping over themselves. “He called me Barnes. Then James.”

It is like a switch has been flipped: Weapon’s eyes narrow, mouth twisting into an ugly snarl of anger. In a second his hand is around Asset’s throat, squeezing. “Liar,” he whispers in a dangerous voice. Instead of ice-cold precision his eyes are foggy and far away, and he does not meet Asset’s gaze, instead staring somewhere just over its shoulder, as if into the distance. He squeezes a little harder, says, “He’s dead.”

He throws Asset across the room, knocking the breath out of its lungs and cracking its head painfully against the wall. All it feels is confusion, eyebrows crinkling as Weapon punches a hole in the wall, shouting, “James Barnes is dead! I watched him die!”

Asset does not comprehend. It is alive, and Weapon surely could not have watched. This was many wipes ago, long before Weapon’s own creation. It can’t mean that it is this James Barnes. So why is Weapon so upset, then?

Weapon stalks quickly over to where Asset sits against the wall. Thrusting a hand into Asset’s hair and pulling, Weapon pulls Asset up and yanks it closer. Their noses nearly brush; Asset finds its breath shortening, like it is gearing up to take a leap. Weapon’s nostrils flare, and through the confused glaze his pupils dilate.

Asset bares the curve of its neck.

When Weapon brushes his nose over the swath of skin, Asset makes a noise it has never made before. Weapon follows it up with his mouth, the hot circle of his lips, and Asset feels its thighs tremble. Its chest begins to strain as its breaths grow even shorter, heartbeat thudding almost painfully against its ribcage.

Weapon bites, hand tugging at Asset’s hair still in his fist. Asset lets out a sound that makes Weapon growl and bite harder. The feeling is—Asset has never experienced anything like it, how it makes it feel both hot and cold, leaves a hole in it wanting more. It is not supposed to want. That is not its objective.

_(How does it even know what want feels like?)_

_(But somehow, impossibly, want feels like hot mouths, slender fingers, blue eyes and a rabbit runs across the road again—)_

Its metal hand grabs Weapon’s hair, tugging. It seals their mouths together, and their teeth clack. It’s messy, and imperfect, and they move purely on instinct because Asset does not know what this is, why it wants to—to—

_Kiss,_ its battered mind supplies.

_It feels good, don't it, Stevie?_

The voice is back, whiskey-smooth with a rough New York accent. Teasing, cajoling. Clearly confident in his charm. Weapon licks into its mouth, and Asset startles before parting its lips further, allowing that thick, velvet slide in and meeting its retreat with its own. What is it doing? It shivers, full-body.

_Yeah,_ the voice says. _That’s good. Jesus, you’re a natural. Got me feelin’ some sorta way._ It pitches lower, a smirk clearly audible. _You wanna feel?_

Weapon’s hand is a broad, solid weight on the back of Asset’s neck as he keeps it there and bites hard at Asset’s lower lip, enough to draw blood. The taste of iron smears across their mouths, sparks something awake inside Asset that makes it growl “ _Mine_ ”; some sort of bone-deep command that surpasses even those of HYDRA’s.

It is at that moment, though, that the door to the safe house opens with the arrival of their extraction team. One look at the face of their handler is all that Asset needs: it tries to dart forward to him, protecting Weapon, but a taser to its side makes it briefly stumble. The split second hesitance is enough for the remaining agents to pin both Asset and Weapon to the ground. Asset screams, blood still on its lips. Behind it, muted, is the struggle of Weapon as he tries to kick off the agents placing the heavy-duty cuffs around his wrists. He's snarling, teeth audibly snapping together.

A sharp injection at the vulnerable nape of Asset’s neck means the tranquilizer; the last things it hears before darkness slips over it is Rumlow saying, “I fuckin’ told Pierce that letting Captain America reunite with his old buddy was a bad idea. One look at the history books and you know there was more than they were letting on—”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i keep saying that i'm going to make the chapters longer, but it's just not working out that way. good news: i think this should end around (hopefully) 15k, maybe a little less. thank you all for your continued support; it means the world to me! comments and kudos are great <3


	5. Chapter 5

_The room is damp concrete and seeping chill. Acrid with the scent of urine and metallic with the taste of blood. And yet he would choose this place again in a heartbeat, because being in here means that his men are still outside and safe for one more miserable day._

_Once, he had been afraid of needles. Now they’re just a brief hurt on top of all the other lingering hurts. The initial injection in his shoulder still burns; when he recalls the ice spreading down his arm and burning into his chest he shivers. They had been speaking German, but it was way outside what he’d learned for the front. The gist of what he could capture was that they were experimenting on him, which was obvious enough with the restraints and array of syringes containing different liquids._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_They cut him. He screams. They burn him. He screams. They whip him and torture him and he screams and screams. The pain is insurmountable._

_In twenty-four hours, he always heals._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant.3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_He asks himself why they chose him. He isn’t genetically special. He’s far from the strongest guy in the one-oh-seventh. For a few agonizing hours on the first day he wondered if they somehow found out he was queer. What they would do. Bucky knows that besides Jews and gypsies in those camps there were men and women like him._

_For all of the skirts he’s chased, and for all of them his hand has been allowed to slip under, that was never what Bucky was thinking about._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_He begs for death._

_Bucky once considered himself a proud man. Not especially vain or arrogant, but proud. Pride is one of the few things the Depression couldn’t take from him and he valiantly held onto it with the determination of a child with their favorite toy._

_Proud men don’t beg, his dad had told him. Proud men accept the circumstances, even if it’s death. Once, Bucky could believe it. Before war knocked at his door in the form of a draft letter and suddenly the sheer mortality of life was weighing on him like a granite slab._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_Time doesn’t exist down here. Or, at least, not in the way it does above ground, where there are clocks and light and dark to differentiate between its cycles. Here there’s only fluorescent lighting, concrete walls, his own blood and urine and fear. Bucky keeps track of the time with experiments and the accelerated healing with his own body._

_Over and over and over. He holds on to his mother’s face. His sister’s eyes. Steve’s bright smile. His laugh._

_Whenever he passes out it’s harder to come back to lucidity. Like struggling to the surface from the depths of the ocean. Everything feels heavy. Sluggish. Even his own goddamn name becomes difficult to remember._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_They break a few of his fingers. In a few hours Bucky can feel the bones begin to fuse back together. The shallow cuts, he can watch the skin knit itself back together. The doctors don’t speak English, and even if they had Bucky doubts they’d tell him what the fuck is going on._

_Maybe they’ll go too far. Maybe they’ll cut too deep. Please, God. Jesus Christ, let them go too far. Let me die. Whatever they’re doing, whatever I am now, please let me die._

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8._

_“Please,” he begs. Zola often oversees the sessions, and usually Bucky tunes him out, vibrating with rage. But something slips today, a tipping point that leaves him weak and desperate. The deep gashes on his chest and biceps scream, the burns from the cattle prod ugly starbursts on his abdomen. “Please. Just fucking kill me already. I ain’t gonna slip any state secrets. I don’t even_ have _any. I’m just a fucking_ sergeant _.”_

_“Oh, but Sergeant Barnes, you are so much more than that.” Zola draws close to the table, peering down at Bucky through his round coke-bottle lenses. There’s something twisting one side of his mouth up that on anyone else would be called a smile: on him, it makes Bucky shiver. Zola is a snake, twisting and writhing in his path._

_“You are now special,” Zola continues. “You will become the thing that will win us the war.”_

_Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8…_

——

It happens again.

Again.

**Again.**

**_Again_ —**

——

It is most vulnerable right on the cusp of being awakened. The American inside its mind—that is who it has associated that voice, and its strong-syllabled accent, with—tries to keep Asset calm. It is hardly a refuse, and normally only makes the Asset madder. Who is this voice to say these things? To claim what this voice claims?

It is strong. It is finely-tuned. It is the whetstone-sharpened silver tip of a blade poised above your chest. It is the sweat that drips down your temples. It _is_ , and it isn’t.

Asset has been taught and trained, manufactured in the art of killing. To its victims, death does not wear a black cloak and carry a silver scythe. To them, the apparition of death is a metal arm and a masked face.

So who is this voice to say that Asset is not what it is? To try and fabricate the misgivings that sometimes plague Asset’s waking thoughts when it has gone some time without a reset? Who is this voice to tell Asset that they can still break free? There is no freedom. A free world is a dangerous world: that is what Asset has been told and what it believes. It is why it complies for these missions, because it will help humanity. Anyone who plants their heels is a threat.

No, Asset thinks, trying to push the American, protesting and shouting, deep into the dark recesses where it becomes a non-threat. It will not let itself be coerced by such demons.

Asset and Weapon have been on a stakeout for seventy-two hours now. No sleep. The effect is barely noticeable, but in the quiet the American’s voice seems to grow in volume, drowning out the mission directives stored in Asset’s brain.

_Please. Please listen to me. Weapon is someone important to us, you gotta understand—_

Asset angrily shakes its head, pressing the heel of its flesh palm to its brow. Weapon looks over from his sniper’s roost. Asset wishes it could blame it on a pesky fly, or a mosquito, but this mission is in the bleak coldness of the Carpathian Mountains, and all they have is snow and ice. It says nothing instead, and Weapon turns back to his post, like the docile servant he is.

The thought surprises Asset. It blinks. That is dangerously close to insubordination. To serve HYDRA is a gift: without it Asset would be nothing. And to be nothing, to live a life without a purpose, is worse than any sort of punishment imaginable.

_He knows you,_ the American insists. _I was there._

Asset clenches its jaw and adjusts its grip on its own rifle. They are partners: of course Weapon knows who it is.

_No,_ says the American. _Who you really are—_

“Shut up!” Asset shouts. Weapon startles, and Asset backs away from the window, gripping its hair in tight fists, hard enough to hurt. “Вы не правы…you’re wrong.”

_Listen to me—_

“No!”

“Актив?”

Weapon’s voice has Asset looking up, disoriented. The voice inside its head shouts louder, an incessant beating drum against the walls of its skull. Its temples throb. Weapon’s eyes are bright blue, their pupils large in the dim light. The scar tissue is a light, shiny pink. His dark brows are furrowed in consternation. When he blinks his lashes are like the fanning edges of a paintbrush.

Asset wishes it could take the butt of the rifle to its own head, over and over again. Until the voice stops. Until its heart ceases to beat and it is left, cold and finally dead.

“Tell him he is wrong,” Asset says, strained.

Weapon blinks and goes to put his hand on Asset’s shoulder. Shoving him away, Asset repeats, “Tell him he is wrong!”

“Who?” asks Weapon. “Who is wrong? There is no one here but us, Актив.”

“The American!” Asset shouts. “He is inside my head telling these awful lies. Please,” it adds, for the Asset is not afraid to beg, “tell him.”

Weapon’s concern begins to morph into skepticism. “We have a mission to finish,” he eventually says. “Maybe you should let me—”

“Do you not have it, too?” Asset asks, whirling on him. It grabs onto the front of Weapon’s uniform. “Is there not a voice in the back of your mind?”

Weapon shoves it away, then stalks back to his roost. Irritably he says, “Perhaps you have gone too long without a reset. Our handlers did say that this could pose a problem.”

“Why will you not listen to me?” Asset can feel the anger burning inside its chest. Its metal arm clicks and whirrs with its agitation, fingers curling into a fist as it stares at Weapon’s hunched form. “You are _mine_ —”

Asset’s back makes contact with the crumbling brick of the wall behind it, its metal arm flashing out on instinct. Weapon barely flinches as it presses against his throat. He glares at Asset. His hands, where they grip Asset’s waist, tighten.

“Are you sure,” Weapon asks, low, “if you are not _mine_?”

Something sparks bright inside Asset. It was given Weapon. It _owns_ Weapon. It snarls, says, _“Fuck you.”_ Asset pushes its metal forearm harder into Weapon’s throat. Weapon shoves it down, slides his gloved hands up Asset’s sides to the hinges of his jaw. Weapon’s pupils are large, his BPM increasing slightly. His eyes flick down, then back up.

“You are mine,” he says just before pressing their mouths together. Asset stills, then kisses back.

——

Pierce stands before them both, hands clasped behind his back in a more casual version of the parade rest that Weapon and Asset instinctively fall into. They have been brought to his office, and Asset can’t help but feel out of place in all the shiny chrome and glass. Old, outdated, anachronistic. Dirty in such a clean setting, especially after a long mission and a longer flight.

Asset also cannot help but let its thoughts trail back to the mission and their roost. The shiver of fear and adrenaline that had gone through it the moment Weapon kissed it. It had allowed itself to become careless, diverge from its programming; that is something that Asset has not done for many resets. But it…does not think that it regrets any of it. They were still able to take the targets down clean and get to their extraction point.

This type of visit is rare enough that Asset keeps trying to shake off any misgivings. It and Weapon aren’t things usually brought up to this level: for all their importance to the organization, they are still things to be kept in the dark out of sight. Ghost stories and propaganda and nothing more.

“My Asset, Weapon,” Pierce says, nodding to them both. “The infallible fists of HYDRA.” He steps forward, hands falling to his sides. Asset’s chin raises a little higher, and from the corner of its eye it can see Weapon square his shoulders. “You have done so much for the world,” continues Pierce. “You have been good.” Internally Asset preens. Good. It is good. “The course of history has been changed because of your actions, Asset. And with Weapon by your side we can change the future.”

Weapon looks over. Asset follows. Blue eyes meet blue, the scar shining in the light from the floor-to-ceiling windows. A shiver overtakes Asset, all the way to its bones. It cannot help but think of the mission again. The hot slide of Weapon’s mouth and the sharp bite of his teeth. How it had awoken something heated and animal inside Asset and how it had kissed back harder in turn.

Pierce must not know. He must never find out.

Closing the distance Pierce takes Asset’s chin in his hands, turning it side to side, inspecting. He does not reach for Weapon. Asset stares into Pierce’s cold eyes and does not blink, not even when Pierce’s cool fingers trail down Asset’s cheek and jawline. They trace over its lower lip and Asset suppresses a shudder at both the touch and the thought that maybe, somehow, Pierce already knows.

“After we kick off the first phase of Project Insight, your next mission will be the most important mission of your lives.” Pierce’s eyes narrow as he steps back. “Once you complete this mission we will be able to restore balance to society. We will no longer have to hide in the ranks of government organizations. HYDRA can take place where it belongs.”

Deliberately he stares at Weapon as he says, “Take out the Avengers.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for such a short chapter, but think of it as the beginning of the end.

They are sent to a brief cryosleep. Weapon goes under first, and Asset watches the ice overtake him slow, inexorable. It is hit with the sudden urge to force open the chamber door and crawl in alongside Weapon, press their bodies together and let the ice make them one.

It is such a visceral sense of _longing_ that Asset has no idea how to process it. The programming that runs it does not have room for longing: it is a weak emotion and one that weapons do not possess. But still…Asset remembers how Weapon had felt. How he had tasted. How it had made something inside of Asset sing a melody it has never heard.

The thoughts are confusing, jumbling, twisting and turning over each other with no direction, throughout prep. First the cold water and odorless, clinical soap. Then the feeding tube shoved down its throat, eyes watering through a series of gags that make the techs overseeing the procedure chuckle among themselves.

When it is Asset’s turn for the chamber, it does not actively fight it, but it does not go willingly, either. The technicians drag it bodily to its own chamber across the room and Asset does not stop staring at Weapon’s and the frost on the glass, the still shadow of his face, even when it has to crane its neck. Only a slap gets it to stare straight ahead.

It accepts the injection of drugs into its flesh arm grudgingly, thinking, for the first time in many wipes, how quickly it could break free. The cuffs are strong enough for his flesh arm, but there is very little on Earth that can stop its metal one.

Rumlow appears as Asset climbs inside the chamber, its BPM already increasing. It does not like the space. It does not like the cold. It is scared of these things, but a weapon has no choice where it is stored away when not in use. It supposes it could be worse.

He coolly eyes Asset while it is strapped in, and only once everything is in place does he step closer.

“Don’t think you got away with your stunt in the safe house,” he says quietly. Almost languorous in its dangerousness: a tone that makes the fine hairs on Asset’s arm and the back of its neck prickle.

Asset looks at him questioningly and Rumlow laughs. “Right. Maybe you don’t remember. But your body certainly does.” Asset’s eyes widen a fraction as all doubt vanishes; Rumlow _knows_. How, Asset is not sure. But he knows what it and Weapon did on the mission. The way Asset whimpered into Weapon’s mouth, letting its body work on an instinct it hadn't known it possessed.

Fear. It is so afraid. What will they do?

It cannot help but think of torture. Reconditioning.

“We need you,” continues Rumlow, “so we can’t do anything. Not yet.” He grins and it is menacing, sharp like the glint of sun off snow. Asset trembles and hunches down as much as the restraints allow. Rumlow grabs Asset’s chin and drags its head up. “I always suspected you two were fags,” he all but spits. “Pity we can't let the whole world know.”

Rumlow steps back and claps Asset on the shoulder. “I don’t know if robots can dream.” He chuckles as the door is lowered. “Hopefully you can’t.” A click. Hiss.

Asset is becoming cold. So cold. Frost is overtaking the glass, obscuring its view from outside. It lengthens its breaths, relaxes its body. The cold creeps up, working towards its heart. Pain is uncomfortable but Asset has been through worse than feeling its flesh freeze. Eyes close, breathing slows.

It does dream—

——

_“I’ve been in love with you since I was fourteen.”_

_“Why me? Gals are—they’re literally throwing themselves at you. I ain’t got a single thing to offer you ‘sides more grief than I’m worth.”_

_“Are you—shut the fuck up, no. Let me speak. Can you look me in the eye and fuckin’ say that there ain’t_ somethin’ _between us? Somethin’ that…I don’t know. Christ. That’s pulling us together._ _”_

_“Buck, come on. You can’t be serious.”_

_“I_ am _serious, Stevie. What, you think you’re unlovable just ‘cause you get sick?”_

_“It’s more than that, Bucky, and you know it—”_

_"You’re goddamn beautiful. Sometimes I look at you and it takes my fuckin’ breath away."_

_"...You don't needta lie, Buck. I've been five steps away from death's door since I was born, okay? I don't want your pity."_  


_“Fuck you, Steve. I’ve been at your bedside practically our whole lives. I don't give a damn if your back is crooked and you can’t see colors and you’re practically deaf in one ear. I don’t care, because that does not make you_ you _. Don’t you get it, you stubborn fuckin’ punk? I love_ you _. That's not fuckin'_  pity. _”_

_“—Bucky—”_

_"Tell me now that there ain’t somethin’ here. Tell me.”_

_——_

Asset wakes to Weapon’s masked face peering down at it.

Disoriented, Asset blinks a few times behind its goggles as it catalogs its surroundings. The ceiling above fuzzes slightly before sharpening; its ears pick up the steady shriek of a distant alarm. Rubble falls from the ceiling somewhere in the facility.

They are still in the building, though now there is a thin film of soot and ash over everything. Weapon must have taken the scientists down when Asset was knocked out. One lens is cracked, and a dull pain in Asset’s right leg suggests a small fracture. It will heal within an hour’s time and is not mission critical. Already the pain is fading from Asset’s mind.

Its head throbs as it struggles into a sitting position. It’s rare that it gets knocked out during missions. It shudders, knowing that pain and punishment are to follow. Ducks its head. Whipping, more than likely. The cattle prod. It has been made to lick boots before in recompense. There are no such things as choices, but if Asset could choose it would take pain over humiliation.

Asset longs to curl in on itself protectively. But that is not allowed; if the Asset fucks up, it must be taught a lesson. That is Rumlow inside its head, a sneering, arrogant voice while Rollins holds the Asset down.

_Struggle all you want, you know you can’t do anything._

Weapon still stares.

“I’m sorry,” the Asset apologizes. It makes sure that its eyes do not leave the ground as it pulls itself into a kneeling position, hands clasped behind its back. “I have ruined the mission. Punish me as you please.”

Weapon makes a noise. It sounds pained, his breath growing fast and a little erratic. His BPM goes up. Asset continues to kneel.

_Rumlow grips its chin, where the skin is slick from drool. Asset does not scream unless its handlers ask it to, but it cannot stop the muscle movement of its jaw opening soundlessly._

_The world is unsteady and fuzzy. Asset’s eyes cannot focus; Rumlow laughs, squeezing Asset’s jaw roughly before letting go. When the punch comes, Asset does not brace itself._

In the silence that follows Asset tenses, waiting for a blow. When nothing comes, it begins trembling. Still, Asset does not look up. It cannot. It _will not_. If this is a test then it will pass with flying colors, to make up for its grievous error.

“Bucky.”

It’s quiet, but Asset hears the word as though it were a gunshot. Its head snaps up.

Weapon tears off his goggles, allowing Asset to see the emotions twisting his face, like raw torture. Like there is a war going on in his mind and Weapon is in the middle of it, unsure which side he is on. Pupils are tight, focus lost somewhere in the middle ground.

Asset knows that look. Though it is rarely allowed to see its reflection it can viscerally experience what Weapon is going through, second by second: the confusion, the fear, the sense of general displacement

Weapon snarls, dropping his goggles and clutching the sides of his head. Under his breath he is muttering a steady stream of _no_ s, shaking his head like an animal trying to shoo a pesky fly. Asset slowly stands, cautious.

That name, this Bucky…it sounds familiar.

“Am I…” it starts before Weapon’s hand flings out and backhands Asset across the face. Its head snaps to the side, and it stumbles but remains upright. Iron floods its mouth from where its teeth cut into the soft meat of its cheek.

“Weapon,” it tries again, receiving another backhand.

Spitting out the blood, Asset watches Weapon’s shaking shoulders, his white knuckles where he grips his hair. A memory surfaces, the Black Forest and a name, such a simple, American name that sounds so familiar…

Asset opens its mouth. Vague, it can recall waking from cryosleep. Opening its eyes to see Weapon looking down at it, something soft and terribly comforting in his eyes. The tender way his mouth shaped around that name, Bucky, like he had been saying it for years. _Decades_. A regional inflection lost from their minds but not their tongues.

Asset whispers, “Steve.”

Neurons fire. It can almost see its brain lighting up, a thousand different doorways opening. HYDRA’s programming spreads spiderweb cracks.

Weapon rounds on Asset, blue eyes feral, teeth bared. His big hands go around Asset’s throat, his ragged voice yelling, “I am not Steve!” as those hands squeeze, crushing Asset’s trachea. It could easily dislodge Weapon with its metal arm, but it does not. It cannot. In front of it is not its weapon.

_This is Steve, charging into battle half-cocked, using only his rage as his motivator—_

For the second time during the mission Asset’s world fades into pain and darkness. Like a lover’s touch, Asset welcomes its embrace.


	7. Chapter 7

_“I got the letter today, Stevie. You and I both know there ain’t no way to escape this. You either enlist, or you get drafted. There ain’t no way to hide from this war.”_

_“I don’t care how many recruiting stations I gotta go to ’til I get in. I wanna do my duty, too. It’s only fair. It ain’t right to be here like—like some_ dame _, waiting for my fella to get home while I collect fuckin’ scraps.”_

_“You and I both know you ain’t gonna get in. I’m sorry. Stevie. Steve…aw, hell, sweetheart, don’t cry. You know I can’t stand it when you cry, c’mon.”_

_“I’ve already lost my ma, I can’t stand to lose you,_ too _—”_

——

“Bucky!” 

Asset is groggy, head throbbing. A quick inspection shows that it is not a concussion. The world dips in and out of a foggy focus for a couple moments until Asset can finally open its eyes and take in its surroundings.

A steady swaying motion suggests that they are back in the small jet that had taken them to their drop-off point. Its brows furrow. Did they complete the mission? Was the target eliminated? Asset goes to lift its head up and moans. As consciousness returns so does pain; its larynx is bruised and several throbbing bruises on its face suggest that Weapon did not stop there.

“What did you do to him? Where are you? Bucky? Bucky!”

A scream. Pain, anger. It ricochets into the very core of Asset’s being. It knows that voice. That is Weapon’s voice, so deep and soothing. Befitting of his new body, rather than his scrawny one.

Asset stops. Where did that thought come from? Weapon has never looked any different than he does now. But if that is true, then why does this small boy, this fragile, beautiful wisp of a boy, plague its thoughts? Its dreams? Asset has seen him there, smiling to rival the sun in all his beautiful golden glory.

Asset closes its eyes. And for a second it is horizontal. Instead of the seat it is on a table, and this table incites the same sour spike of fear that the Chair does. Disoriented, it can only speak a sequence of numbers, 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8, that mean nothing and everything all at once.

Then Weapon is there, sooty and filthy and beautiful and _big_ , and Asset says, “Steve?" even though this man is not that small beautiful boy Asset knew. And this Steve-that-is-not-Steve smiles and though Asset can barely hold onto its name it knows what this feeling swooping low in its belly is.

Weapon screams again. Calls out that name, that Bucky, that makes Asset’s stomach jolt unpleasantly. It is almost akin to familiarity, but Asset does not go by Bucky, even on covert missions. It is not an alias. It is a nickname, something personal. When Weapon speaks again his voice cracks, the “Bucky” that comes out small and thready and— _scared?_

Its head hurts so bad. When unconsciousness encroaches at the corners of its vision Asset welcomes it.

——

_“Listen to me. Steve. Listen, okay? You ain’t gonna lose me. Even if I die—shut up, Steve, for once in your goddamn life just shut the fuck up—I’m not gonna be gone. I know this is gonna sound like a crock of shit but I’m always gonna be_ here _—”_

——

The phantom touch of a hand on its chest, over its heart, lingers.

Because it has not been wiped Asset experiences visual trauma as soon as it regains consciousness. Without the wipes to clear the intricate roads in its neural pathways there is a confusing jumble of images all crashing together at an alarming rate, rapid-fire and almost impossible to process. It is in clear distress, mission-critical, but they know already, because it is strapped to the Chair back at base.

Next to it the machine beeps as it monitors Asset’s heart. There is no feeding tube hooked into its stomach, which Asset counts as a win. It detests the feeling of growing full without its consent. There is an IV in the back of its flesh hand, like usual, and a nameless technician seated in a chair on Asset’s right.

The room is quiet. The hairs on the back of Asset’s flesh arm stand up. It looks around, blinking hard at the throbbing in its temples and the bruises very slowly subsiding on its face. Where is Weapon? It wants to ask, but it is afraid of repercussion.

It thinks—it remembers Weapon screaming. The recollections are fuzzy, and Asset has long since learned not to trust these things. Why would Weapon be screaming? He never does. He is stronger than Asset, always has been. That has always been a source of admiration for Asset.

“Mission report.”

Pierce appears from the shadows, face unreadable. Asset hunches its shoulders instinctively, then says, “Target eliminated. There was some damage sustained, but nothing mission critical. Steve took him out—”

Asset stops. Pierce does not move. Asset’s mouth is dry, fear trickling ice-cold down its spine. This is worse than defection. Asset wants so badly to cower, show the back of its neck in submission and beg for forgiveness the way it has been taught. This is _remembering_. Weapon should only be Weapon. The Asset should only be the Asset. There is no room in HYDRA for this kind of insubordination.

It knows. Somewhere deep in those neural synapses of its brain, deep in the forgotten crevasses of its memory, Asset knows that it is right. It was correct in its assumption about what—who—it is. Who Weapon is, and what they mean.

It is Bucky. Weapon is Steve. Though the significance of these identities besides the names is not immediately clear, they are…Asset does not know of a word, but they have a pull stronger than any magnet. It is almost sure that if Weapon were not here right now Asset would be looking for him, tearing apart the earth itself in its search, wearing the fingers of its flesh hand to the bleach white of the bone.

There was a story that Asset had heard on one of its missions, wipes and wipes ago, that managed to dig its roots in. An ancient Greek myth that humans were created with four arms, four legs, and four eyes. And because Zeus was afraid that they would one day be able to overtake him, he split each human up to leave them wandering the world aimlessly, always searching for their other half.

The gears and plates in the metal arm whir when Asset flexes its fist. They begin to click as Asset stares down at it, its fear quickly subsiding in the face of agitation. It is not a whole, it is a half, searching. Cursed for the rest of its life to be a half-moon of itself, eclipsed in sadness and longing. Maybe that explains some of the emptiness in its chest. The omnipresent feeling that it is missing something vital.

Despite knowing that struggling is useless Asset tries anyway. That red-hot anger fills it up again, but this time with purpose, its poison-tipped arrow pointed at a clear target. HYDRA. Its makers. How it got here, like this, Asset still is not sure: it remembers cold, but for the Winter Soldier cold is everywhere; in its heart, its bones, inside every precise kill it has made.

It does not want the chamber. Not the blissful darkness of cryosleep, either. Weapon’s— _Steve’s_ —face comes back to it, blue eyes and handsome despite the ugly scar across his eye, and a rabbit darts out in front of a car on a seldom-used snowy road—

“Don’t take him from me,” Asset says, before it truly knows what it is doing. It looks imploringly up at Pierce who, stone-faced, still has not moved. Asset wets its lips. “Wipe everything but him. Please. He is my—my shadow. My other half. Without him I am hollow. You cannot use an empty weapon.”

Pierce’s palm burns across Asset’s cheek. Asset’s limp hair falls into its eyes as its head dips down. Pierce yanks Asset’s head up and pries Asset’s jaws apart with his thumbs pressed painfully to the hinges. He shoves the mouthguard in so roughly that Asset’s gums throb.

“You are my weapon,” Pierce says, flat, a warning that signifies that Asset’s last chance is already up, “and he is yours. You’re nothing more than soldiers serving a greater purpose. A purpose to humanity: a cleanse for us all. Who he was is not your concern, Asset. You served HYDRA for decades flawlessly before he was brought in, and you will continue to serve us until you are needed no longer.”

He steps back and nods at the white-coated technician scribbling on a clipboard. Asset’s fists clench. Its chest heaves. Blue eyes, blond hair. Steve. Blue eyes, blond hair. _Steve._ Electricity drones like a hive of bees before the pain sets in and every muscle in its body goes rigid, back arching up off the the chair. It screams, and screams. Blue eyes, blond hair. Steve. One half of its soul.

Asset tries to hold onto the mythology for as long as it can. But soon it loses its significance, its words becoming just words, hollow and empty with no meaning behind them. Just another story that Asset has heard on its long life as a weapon of HYDRA.

Sweat-soaked, it collapses onto the chair. The technician removes the mouthguard; Asset flexes its jaw. Pierce steps forward, drawing Asset’s attention up to him.

“Soldier?” he asks.

Asset is only able to nod, still too weak from the residual pain. It seems to satisfy the Director anyway. It lets itself be hauled up, supporting its weight against the technician who leads it to the room with two chambers.

As the door slides open to the empty chamber Asset glances askance at the other. Behind the frosted glass is Weapon, eyes closed, scar tissue pink and skin pale and tinged blue.

_Blue eyes, blond hair…_

Asset reaches out when the door to its chamber shuts. Weapon’s face is the last thing it sees.


	8. Chapter 8

In the darkness this time, there are no dreams.

——

Their mission is the Avengers; Tony Stark is their main target. Without his leadership they will collapse like a house of playing cards. Taking him out will be easy; though he has the suit, he is not an enhanced individual and therefore no match for Asset and Weapon.

The Avengers live in a building in downtown Manhattan. It is guarded, and has several security measures, but those won’t matter. HYDRA controls more than people think.

Asset keeps stealing looks at Weapon during the briefing that is more for the sake of the agents than the weapons. More than once its eyes travel, as though drawn by a magnet, to the full curve of Weapon’s lips. Each time its face grows hot and it must look away quickly.

Usually after a wipe it is fresh, pristine like clean snow. But lately that snow is more like slush, dark gray and melting. It is not glitching, it cannot be, but still it does not understand. It has seen many different people, fought alongside some and killed more, but Weapon is something else entirely. Asset wishes desperately that it had a word for it. It wishes even more desperately that it had a word for the way that Weapon makes it feel.

“Are you okay, Актив?”

Weapon’s voice makes Asset flinch.

“I am fine,” Asset replies. It cannot meet Weapon’s eyes; the blue, which is normally like shards of ice, is softened like spring water. Asset cannot stand that look of almost-caring. It twists something inside Asset that it does not like. It makes Asset want to—to touch. Touch and not kill.

Asset looks down at its mismatched hands. The silver shines in the fluorescent lighting, plates rippling faintly when Asset makes a tight fist. Does it even know how to touch something without killing it? Sure, it has touched Weapon many times, but never like this beast inside it is urging.

It has never touched Weapon like it _cares._

Weapons do not care. They are used, and that is it. They do not feel and they do not—

_Love._

Asset startles and ignores the glance Weapon throws its way. Love is a human feeling. Asset is not human. It is metal and gunpowder and death. Love is for things that are not frozen and thawed and electrocuted and beaten. Love is for things that _are_ loved.

And yet…

Yet, Asset can hear the American, very faint. _You love him_.

Shut up, it wants to snarl. Shut up and stop acting like you know anything.

It does not feel anything for Weapon besides a sense of ownership. They handed Weapon to it; that is its connection. It is not unusual to feel possessive over something you own. And Asset has not owned anything the entirety of its life.

It should tell its handler, tell Rumlow or one of the HYDRA doctors about what it is experiencing. Asset _knows_ it should, but. _But_. For the first time, it is…afraid. There is a feeling deep inside it, something almost instinctive, that says that if Asset tells them, it will be hurt. There are consequences for what it is feeling.

The American comes back. _You know what it is. Where you’re from. You know._

——

Weapon has its disc strapped to its back via the magnets in its harness. Pierce fits him with the mask, but does not give Asset its own. Though curious, Asset does not question the decision; it settles instead into a neat parade rest next to Weapon while they wait to finish being prepped.

Asset is fitted with its knives, its Glock and SIG, then its assault rifle that is slung across its back. They are both given extra ammunition, even though Weapon does not normally use guns. There is something strangely off about this mission prep, but Asset cannot quite place what it is. The mission is crucial; that much they both know. But Weapon avoids Asset’s eyes and does not engage in conversation, even to discuss what they will be doing.

Unease runs its slippery, chilled fingers down Asset’s spine. It is used to being the key component to any mission. While Weapon and Asset often team up, this time it feels, strangely, like Asset is out of the loop. it is not sure if it imagined it or not, but Pierce and Rumlow exchange a pointed look once everything is ready.

“Актив.”

Asset cuts a glance askance. “Оружие.”

Weapon’s scar catches the light when he turns his head towards Asset’s voice. Asset studies it, its pink sheen and jagged edges, the streaks that trail down towards the high cut of Weapon’s cheekbone.

For the first time Asset finds itself wondering where and how he got it. Just like the Asset, Weapon does not scar easily. To leave any sort of lasting mark it takes creativity and no shortness of sadism. Asset does not know why they would choose to scar Weapon at all. Its own metal arm came from necessity; as far as it can tell Weapon was already strong and needed no enhancements or markings.

Resting a hand on Asset’s shoulder, Weapon says, “Вы готовы?”

“Какой глупый вопрос,” replies Asset.

It draws a deep laugh from Weapon. When he laughs it lights up his whole face, and it is not something Asset sees often, for very few things in its existence are pleasurable enough to warrant such a reaction. It is…nice. Weapon has a nice laugh. Then Asset blinks and erases that thought from its mind.

Weapon’s sudden change in demeanor leaves Asset wondering if it had just been hallucinating the strange look on Weapon’s face. Maybe projecting something that wasn't there. Asset does not know, and it does not want to dwell. Mission parameters are of the utmost importance right now.

“We’re ready,” Rumlow says, shutting the back doors to the nondescript black van that will transport them to downtown Manhattan and the Avengers tower. He nods at Pierce, who turns back to Asset and Weapon. Both immediately snap to attention. His face is carefully blank, but Asset has been taught to read people and it often sees the little things that others will miss.

Pierce is hiding something, though of what nature Asset does not know. All it knows is that Pierce’s gaze only lingers on it before turning full-force to Weapon as he briefs them. There is no time to wonder or speculate; they are being loaded into the van, semi-automatics in their hands. Pierce sits across from them and Rumlow slides into the driver’s seat. They are somewhere upstate, that is all Asset knows. It won’t take long to get to the island.

“Remember,” Pierce says, hands clasped in his lap. “This mission is your most important one yet. Complete it, and you will have done the world a great service.” He makes eye contact with Asset. “You are doing _good_. People will thank you for this.”

Asset and Weapon nod.

They look to each other, blue eyes to blue eyes. Asset blinks ( _a rabbit runs across the road, blue eyes, blond hair, blue eyes, blond hair—_ ) and shakes its head. It must focus on the mission. It must do the world this service.

A brief touch to its left shoulder, the sensors there registering the pressure. It turns its head, sees Weapon looking at it again. After a moment, Weapon nods. So does Asset. Their creed goes unspoken, but Asset mirrors Weapon's touch, squeezes the hard muscle of Weapon's right shoulder. They will do this.

——

It is almost too easy to infiltrate the lower level of the Tower. Asset is suspicious for all of one second before Weapon raises his gun and opens fire.

Chaos.

And—

——

Smoke and alarms blaring and personnel scrambling around. Asset lives for chaos; it does its best work in this type of environment, picking off Stark employees with single, precise shots while Weapon takes the stairwell up to the floors of offices and laboratories above, disc sheathed on his left forearm like a gauntlet.

When reception is clear, Asset holsters its Glock and reaches back for its rifle. The hallway is long, and though Asset 99.9% accurate, it is imperative that all hostiles be taken out on this mission. No exceptions.

The emergency lights illuminate the hallway in intermittent flashes of garish red, like a blood-splattered disco ball. Asset can see something, down by the glass doors. Advancing, it keeps its weapon high, its body spring-loaded, coiled tight.

At the end of the hallway there is a woman. Red hair. Unarmed. _Foolish._ She does not move.

Since Asset does not have its mask on, the look in her eyes says she knows it and then some.

“The least you could do is recognize me.” She smiles, a false smile. Asset does not react except for the plates in its arm recalibrating with a metallic ripple.

“You tried to kill me,” she says, even as Asset remains silent and cold.

And, “You’re Bucky Barnes.”

“Who the hell is Bucky?” replies Asset. It probably has tried to kill her. Anyone this brave has always been a target for the Winter Soldier. But how did she survive? Targets do not survive. Asset cannot recall, through its extensive list of victims, anyone who it had failed to kill.

The woman with red hair still does not move. She says, “You are. James Buchanan Barnes. That’s you.” She adds, “I know you came here to kill Stark, but that isn’t going to happen. I’m sorry.”

Asset raises its gun, falling into the instinctual motions that go with handling a weapon. It does not need to think about this; killing is its programming, its primary function. Stark is its target, and Stark will die, even if this red-haired woman also has to die.

She does not back down even with the gun trained on her. “You know he wouldn’t have wanted this.”

“Who?” snarls Asset. It is sick of this time-wasting. It needs to find Weapon.

Before the red haired-woman can respond a man comes running around the corner. He is blond, short, carrying a bow and a quiver of arrows strapped to his back. He is breathless, sweaty, eyes wild.

“Nat,” the archer breathes, “Nat, I’m sorry, but you’re not gonna like this.”

“What?” the woman with red hair—Nat?—replies, though her eyes do not leave Asset’s.

“There’s another one. This one didn’t try to blow up the building. There—Jesus, Nat. I found Steve. It was him. He’s HYDRA’s other weapon.”

Steve. At the mention of that name Asset is transported back to a Black Forest clearing, Weapon’s warm weight next to it, _Steve_ still on its tongue. The familiarity. The urge to protect him, no matter the costs. Dizziness overtakes Asset for a moment, making the smoke-filled room swirl around it.

“Steve?” it says, the cogs in its head turning. For a few seconds it is not even aware that it has spoken.

Both stare at it. Back at themselves. It is finally the woman with red hair who asks, “Do you know Steve?”

_Blond hair, blue eyes. The press of lips against its own in the safe house, the desire, the_ longing _that accompanied it…_

Asset shakes its head roughly, gripping at its hair with the hand not on the trigger. No. It does not know a Steve. The moment of confusion is over and it raises its gun again, pulling the trigger with its next exhale. The mission is still at hand and Asset cannot afford any distractions. It must find Weapon and they must take out Mission: Avengers. HYDRA is counting on them.

The archer pushes the red-haired woman—Nat? _Natalia_ —away, then reaches behind to grab an arrow from its quiver. Asset brings up its left arm and the arrow bounces off.

“Nat, _go_ ,” the archer insists, already reaching for another arrow. “I’ve got this one.”

The woman hesitates for only a second before running back down the hallway and out of sight. This leaves only the Asset and the archer. It deflects an arrow again with its arm, but it does not account for the agility of the archer and grunts in surprise when the archer uses the wall to his left for momentum to land on Asset’s back.

The arrow had been a ploy. Asset is angry that it let itself get so distracted. Just by a _name_. The archer is small but strong and uses his low center of gravity to his advantage, trying to topple them both over.

“You’re Bucky,” the archer says. The thin, unyielding body of an arrow is suddenly at Asset’s throat, making it choke as it presses ruthlessly into its windpipe. “I’ve seen your face. Steve talked about you. Gotta say, Steve painted you out to be a lot more personable than you really are.”

“Who is Bucky?” the Asset asks in between gasps. “And who—is—Steve?”

“You know who Bucky is,” the archer insists. He would have managed to lay Asset out flat if it hadn’t been for Asset’s enhanced arm and skeletal system. As it is, Asset dislodges him with a grunt, but the archer is not deterred as he rights himself and continues. “And you know who Steve is. He was your best friend, wasn't he, Bucky?”

_Not was, never was, always is, Steve is always here—_

“No,” hisses Asset. Hearing that name make Asset feel as if it is in the chair, the halo strapped to its head. The pain is sharp, stark, almost makes Asset grow cross-eyed with it. It reaches quickly for its Glock, but the archer is just as fast with his arrows. The weapon is shot out of Asset’s hand, and before it can recover the sharp point of another arrow pierces through its heavy pants and into its thigh.

Asset grunts in pain. Looking down, it grabs the shaft of the arrow it rips it out of its skin, tossing it to the side. When it looks back up, the archer is gone, leaving an empty, smoke-filled hallway lit periodically with bursts of red light.


	9. Chapter 9

It cannot find Weapon. It feels untethered, a buoy drifting aimlessly at sea. Asset does not know what it is, what it means. It cannot be _codependence_ , because the Asset depends on no one besides its handlers.

Asset does not know. It does not know.

Asset makes it up the stairs, taking out two more of the enemy as it goes. Their bodies fall, lit by the red light: red on their skin, on the walls and floor behind them. Asset does not blink at it. Once in the main floor where the blueprints showed it was most likely Stark would be it holsters its gun and unsheathes a knife.

To its right is a long room, all glass. Inside are familiar apparitions in gleaming metal. Asset knows the sight of these intimately; it stops, heart rate increasing, sweat prickling its skin. Fear chokes it, climbing the back of its throat with sharp kitten-claws. Because it has been trained not to do so, Asset does not make a sound despite its distress.

It can feel how wide its eyes are. Hazy images surface: a pair of mismatched hands, horror accompanying it; countless injections and corrections and the sharp crack of its bones being broken. A throat gone bloody from screaming, over and over, a small, weaselly man laughing over the bed because _everyone you love is dead, Sergeant. No one can save you now. No one can hear you scream._

It is a medical room.

Sterile, unassuming, it is clearly not the room at base that Asset goes to for tech, nor is it the one in its mind, but Asset still flinches violently, gripping the handle of its knife harder. It is trembling, now. Shakes its head, presses the palm of its flesh hand hard against its temple, like the pressure will loosen these images and make them fall away, shatter on the ground like ice or glass.

It cannot afford distraction.

There is a mission at hand. The mission is the Avengers. The priority is Tony Stark.

It must focus. It must complete this mission. Anything less than one hundred percent completion will be met with punishment and correction. Where is Weapon? Asset has no guidance, nothing to tell it where to go or what to do. It is intuitive, but it has next to no knowledge of its mission parameters without Weapon around.

_3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8…_

What do those numbers mean? They surface in Asset’s mind groggily, dripping smears. When it blinks the room comes back in a tilted, hazy focus. Suddenly Asset feels woozy. Sharp spikes of pain flash in its skull, like mini lightning bolts.

It has to get out of here. This medical room only means pain, conditioning, reconditioning, punishment, _I have to find Steve, where is he—_

There is no Steve. Who is Steve? Asset grips its knife harder until the handle digs painfully into its palm. The pain usually clears its focus, but this time it does nothing.

_“Bucky, listen to me, please. You’re in there, I know you are. Fight it. This isn't who you are.”_

Steve?

No, that had been the…the soldier, and the soldier had been lying. Confused.

_3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8…_

But the soldier had blue eyes. And Steve had blue eyes. Both pairs had looked at the Asset like it was more than just a weapon. They had stared with an intensity that had lit something inside Asset, something kindling low and steady.

It had been like Weapon’s eyes in the extraction point, in the safe house before HYDRA had come to retrieve them. Focused and determined and threaded through with something hot.

_A rabbit runs across the road, then stops. It turns back. Its eyes are the same burning blue._

——

Back out in the hallway a group of HYDRA soldiers runs by. Inside, Asset tries out the numbers, 3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8, their syllables falling clumsily from its tongue.

——

The woman with the red hair is back.

She stares at Asset. She is still unarmed. Asset does not make a move. Knife still in its hand, though held down at its side; why, it does not know. Its metal fingers twitch.

She says, “You remember, don't you?”

Continues: “About Steve. About yourself. You know who you are, who he is.”

_3-2-5-5-7-0-3-8…_

Asset grits its teeth and growls. It is the Asset. It has shaped the century before and it must do it one more time. They are counting on it. The world is counting on it. What is it but the property of HYDRA and the creation of the Russians?

“Steve,” the woman with red hair says, “told me about you. He told me things no history book or biography had ever published.”

“I am nothing,” replies Asset. There is no need for history books, because Asset’s mark never touches them. It has been trained to be a ghost. Its assassinations are debated for decades after it is put back on ice and stored away. There is a reason the Asset’s designation is _it_ : long before Pierce, before HYDRA, even, they had decided that a weapon would be genderless. A weapon is no longer a person, regardless of what is between their legs.

“Not according to Steve.” The woman with the red hair—Nat, its mind supplies again, but Asset does not know a Nat, or a Natalia, _a small girl with a ballerina’s grace and a killer’s eye for accuracy_ —does not stop. “Steve told us, Bucky. How you grew up together. Fought together.” Her gaze becomes sharp, predatory, oddly like a panther circling its kill. “He loves you. He never stopped.”

Asset’s body trembles, from its boots to its neck. Anger makes it see red, or is that just the flashes of the emergency lights? It does not know. The ground beneath it feels off-kilter. Like it is on a ship on rough seas. It aches for the scent of blood, the spray of it on his hands and face. It wants to rip this red-haired woman’s— _Natalia, you are so skilled for someone so small_ —throat out and watch her choke.

It cannot move.

The Asset does not get love. It is not loved. It is used, and tossed aside, and forgotten about until it is needed again. It is broken and mended and cracked with age, rusting and corroded at the seams. Every weapon has a shelf life, and Asset knows. It thinks it has known ever since it was first woken up and taken to Weapon for the very first time.

_“Times are changing. Why settle for one Fist when you can have two? Especially this brand-new one that’s gonna make a lotta people tremble in their boots.”_

“No,” replies Asset. Low and wounded, strained, it does not even sound like its voice. The rabbit runs across the road, then back again, then stops. Its blue eyes stare at Asset, golden-blond fur shining in the sunlight. “I do not…” It stumbles, then rights itself quickly and grips the handle of its knife tighter.

It makes sense. Of course it does. Had this mission been part of the plan, too?

The woman with the red hair still stares, calm, unmoving.

Asset blinks. It says, “Natalia,” hoarse, thickly accented with Russian.

Nat doesn’t smile, but her lips twitch. “Yeah, that’s me.”

Where is Weapon? Asset has been compromised. This woman is playing tricks, and Asset still does not know where Mission: Tony Stark is. It does not know a Natalia. It cannot.

Like she has noticed the Asset’s inner turmoil, the woman reaches for her sleeve; seconds later something small is flying through the air and landing on Asset’s metal arm. A surge of electricity goes through it, making Asset groan briefly in pain as the plates on its arm lock up; with clumsy fingers it pries the object off, drops it to the floor. A quick rotation of the arm shows that it is still working, but it was enough for the woman to escape again.

Asset follows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tumblr is [here!](http://endofadream.tumblr.com) as always, comments and kudos make my day <3


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW HELLO I AM ALIVE. i am so sorry for the delay!!! life sucks, i moved to NY, and now i'm here. and i knew if i didn't post soon i would just keep writing, erasing, and re-writing this chapter forty more times. thank you for everyone who has continued reading and supporting this! i love every single one of you <3

Think. Room is hazy, thoughts are hazy—Asset feels like it is somewhere between asleep and awake, everything struggling through its mind molasses-slow.

Mission parameters. Those it knows. It repeats them in its mind, over and over, in a way that feels strangely familiar, and it latches onto that familiarity. It is sure that it is not being double-crossed, because it knows what it is capable of. They would not risk retribution. The Asset breathes death, exhales it like poison.

It forgets what the red-haired woman— _Natalia—_ said, then remembers it again. It repeats: a cycle. Takes inventory: it is still armed, all weapons still in place. Surroundings: abandoned office; no one is around.

Mission. The mission.

Asset hates the icy claws of cryofreeze, but it yearns for it the way the abused yearns for its abuser. Cryofreeze clears its mind and sharpens its focus.

The _mission_.

Stark. The Avengers. It and Weapon were brought here to destroy them and stop their dismantling of HYDRA’s organization. They pose a great threat to Pierce’s vision for a new world.

Asset pushes open the nearest door. It takes it back out into the hallway, and Asset follows the lights reflecting off the floor. The layout of the building is still fresh in its mind as Asset closes its eyes and draws forward the images.

Stark Tower is fairly cut and dry, as far as blueprints go. Asset takes a right, then a left.

_There is no one here._

Up the stairs, back out into the hallway.

Bullet casings on the ground, the walls pockmarked with spiderwebbed holes. Weapon was here. Was. Where is he now?

Asset thought they would not risk retribution, but it can read situations. And when Stark is nowhere to be found, and the sounds of distant fighting fall away, Asset—briefly—considers escaping. This means nothing good.

It swallows. The saliva gets stuck in its throat. Up one more flight of stairs, still no one. No one. No one. Asset is alone, and to be alone is to—to—

_Alone is the bottom of a ravine, the sky endless gray above, snow biting at every inch of skin. Alone is eyelids half-closed, praying for something else,_ someone _else—_

“Актив.”

Asset whirls around, the glitch dissipating like smoke.

Weapon stands in the doorway, tall and imposing and righteous. His unnatural stillness mirrors Asset’s, born of their training, and Asset holds its ground.

“Оружие,” returns Asset. Seeing Weapon flares warmth in its chest; the urge to step forward and reach out is almost overwhelming. But there is nothing in Weapon’s eyes except smoke and gunpowder. The blue is like ice, sharp and unforgiving.

“What happened to Stark?” Asset asks.

It suspects it already knows the answer, and Asset holsters its rifle. Its palms itch for the knives strapped to its thighs, but the precarious balance of the room stops it.

Weapon takes in the movement, but does not comment. Instead, he says, “You know what happened.” He squares his broad shoulders.

Asset does the same, though it has no intention of fighting back. “So you knew all along.”

Weapon looks at the Asset like it is dirt on the bottom of his boot. “You are weak,” he snarls. “HYDRA is done wasting resources on you.”

Asset knows nothing but total obedience. But it also knows that this is not right. Weapon means… _something_ to Asset. Something that makes the Asset hurt, but also feel good. Almost…safe.

“Why?” the Asset asks.

“You were always a cheap imitation. The Russians tried, but all they succeeded in doing was creating a generic supersoldier. They needed someone better. Someone like—”

“Steve Rogers,” whispers Asset. The name alone spikes pain in its head. If it troubles Weapon he does not show it. The name tastes like hard candy, brick, and sea air in Asset’s mouth. Like cities long forgotten. On the back of his tongue is the rust aftertaste of blood.

“They can wind your gears back more and more,” Weapon is saying, “but eventually you will snap.”

Asset does not know a Steve Rogers. Does it?

“You need me,” says Asset, like Weapon hadn't spoken at all. It is still thinking of this Steve Rogers, who he is, what he means. “Without me—what are you?”

“I am the new Fist,” Weapon says, eyes narrowed, mouth set in a scowl. As Asset looks at him, an image appears in its mind: not the rabbit, for once, but something also small and blue-eyed—a boy? Frail, slender, like a willow. But anything other than weak.

“You need me,” Asset repeats. An image coalesces in its mind. Arm slung over a shoulder. A camaraderie that, to the outside, seemed normal, but sometimes fingers brushed too low, or eyes caught too long. “You—you are him.”

The words trip uncertainly, like they’re stepping over a hole in the ground they thought was there. “Steve,” says Asset, and the name fits perfectly in its mouth, sweet and sour where it rolls off its tongue.

“No, I am Оружие,” Weapon says angrily. But Asset is not listening.

Its mind is a cacophony: when its eyes close, zigzags of images like lightning bolts tear across the darkness. Two boys. Blond- and brown-haired. Two boys, always together, never apart, not until a letter ripped them away.

The blond-haired boy, suddenly big. Like Weapon. Big, but those eyes, that mouth, still the same.

_Steve?_

Pressing its flesh hand to its temple, Asset takes a step back. One protocol overrides everything HYDRA had installed in it: protect Steve. Steve is…Weapon? Then who is Asset? It is the brown-haired boy in those glitches, but who is it?

“No,” Asset says, opening its eyes and taking in its surroundings. The hallway, brimming with smoke and littered with bullet casings. Commotion some floors above and below, distant shouts and gunshots. Weapon stands tall, menacing, disc attached to his forearm. That red-and-black shine of it is wrong; Asset sees red-white-and-blue when it looks again.

Weapon is not wearing his mask. In the gray light his hair shines gold. The scar across his face shines, too. Asset sees the righteousness that ebbs off Weapon like it’s a tangible thing, like if it were to reach out it could touch it, take it in its metal fingers and sift it around.

A sharp pain zigzags across Asset’s forehead. Another flash: two boys in a trash-strewn alley, the small blond-haired one bleeding from his lip and nose. The darker-haired one, knuckles aching, heart aching, because this stupid, beautiful boy doesn’t know when ti quit.

“No,” says Asset again, voice trembling. It…it is the dark-haired boy, it thinks. It looks at the other boy, this…this _Steve_ , with so much love it rivals the sun. “You are not Weapon. I—I do not think I am Asset, either.”

The white-hot stab of pain makes Asset close its eyes with a groan, both hands coming up to press hard against its temples. A movie reel of flashes, now: an apartment with holes in the wall and cockroaches in the sink; winters spent pressed close in bed, hoping to stave off some of the bone-rattling shivering and pained coughing from the frail body of the blond-haired boy. That first shameful kiss, followed by another.

The boy saying, “Bucky…”

Out loud, Asset groans, “Who the hell is Bucky?”

_You_ a voice says. Some part of it that HYDRA hadn’t managed to beat into submission, some part that survived every wipe, every decade of torture and conditioning.

“They built me to replace you!” Weapon yells. “You are outdated, Актив, obsolete. Who is going to fear a weapon that grows forgetful?”

_I am not forgetful_ Asset thinks.

The glitches it has come to recognize as memories of its past, its life as James Buchanan Barnes, surface inside its head, coalescing into definitive shapes. It was a person. It had ambitions, dreams, desires. It had a life. It— _he_ —wasn’t born a weapon, but tortured, created. He is not the Winter Soldier anymore. He is not anything of HYDRA’s anymore.

His name is Bucky.

"I fell,” he gasps. He viscerally remembers that, remembers the cold and the fear and the pain as he hit rocks that should have killed him, rocks that shattered bone and tore his arm off at the shoulder, leaving the snow deep red—

“I fell,” he says, “and you didn’t fall with me. Then they took me. Remade me. Made me forget who I was.”

“Актив,” Weapon growls. “You are Актив and it is my mission to terminate you.”

James— _no, Bucky, he goes by Bucky, always has since he was a boy and got sick of how many of the others shared his name—_ shakes his head. “No, I am Bucky Barnes, and you are—you are Steve Rogers. You were Captain America. You were my best friend. I told you I was with you ’til the end of the line. I loved you.” He swallows hard. “I _love you._ ”

An inferno grows in Weapon’s—no, in _Steve’s_ eyes. “Shut up!” he snarls. The punch to Bucky’s face leaves him gasping, but he doesn't lose his footing. “My mission is to terminate you,” Steve repeats. “You are my mission.”

“No,” Bucky says. Another punch has him stumbling, iron flooding his mouth. He looks up at Steve, at the ugly scar down his face and the blood congealing above his eyebrow. The next blow comes from Steve’s shield and Bucky collapses onto his knees, spitting out blood and gasping, “You’re my friend.”

“No I’m not!” Steve’s voice is rising, and the next time Bucky looks into his eyes they aren’t blank: confusion and fear cloud them as Steve stares down at Bucky kneeling before him.

“C’mon, Steve,” Bucky says. “I know you’re in there. Fight it. This isn’t you. That stubborn ass little punk from Brooklyn would have never let this happen to him.”

The shield connects with Bucky’s shoulder, pitching him onto all fours. Pain sears, white-hot, through him, making him grit his teeth and breathe in sharp, painful gasps.

“My name is not Steve.” The shield’s edge slams into Bucky’s jaw, sprawling him onto his back, and he can’t bite back the loud cry of pain he lets out as his teeth clack together. “You are my _mission_ ,” Steve says again, landing blow after blow with his fists until Bucky sees nothing but blurs and his head is a beehive of buzzing pain.

Steve backs off, breathing hard. Blood shines as red specks and smears on his knuckles. The pain has become a constant ringing in Bucky’s ears; he looks up, spits out blood and says, “Then finish it, Steve. Terminate me. ‘Cause I’m with you ’til—’til the end of the line.”

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr is [here](http://endofadream.tumblr.com)! reviews are lovely and i cherish them all.


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